1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a vehicle-installed display system for displaying a plurality of items of information in a given display area and a control method thereof.
2. Description of the Related Art
As a known display method (as described in, for example, Japanese Patent Application Publication No. 2003-345330 (JP-A-2003-345330)), when a vehicle-installed display device having only a small display area receives a plurality of items of information to be displayed at a time in a concentrated manner, the display device sequentially and cyclically displays these items of information one after another while switching the display at intervals of a predetermined display time (e.g., 3 seconds).
The above display method is intended to avoid the following situation: if the display device displays a plurality of items of information one after another, using a standard display time (e.g., 10 seconds) predetermined as a period of time for which a single item of information is displayed, it takes at least 20 seconds before the driver visually recognizes the third item of information, for example, resulting in a delay in transmission of the information.
According to the display method as described in JP-A-2003-345330, the display is switched from one item of information to another at the time when a specified display time (e.g., 3 seconds) expires, even though the contents of the respective items of information displayed are different from each other. In some cases, therefore, the driver may not be able to sufficiently recognize the content of a certain item of information within one display time (3 seconds), which is too short for some items of information to be recognized. In other cases, the driver may feel uncomfortable or get embarrassed since the specified display time (3 seconds) is too long for some items of information, thus causing an unnecessary delay in display of the next item of information.